HD, HDV, high-def, 720p, 1080i, 60p and Blu-ray. Those are fightin’ words! Oh and a dash of RSS anyone?

HD, HDV, high-def, 720p, 1080i, 60p and Blu-ray.

Not a real word in the previous sentence. But they are all very important terms currently battling it out in the new frontier of digital video formats. I feel that they are relevant to clients in one very important way, compatibility. No matter what your video is being shot on, all you have two primary concerns. That it should look good and to play when you want it to.

It sounds simple and in the past it was. Before the recent boon in digital technology and new formats, usually tape was how you received you product. It was either on Betacam (usually for broadcast and master copies) or VHS for non-broadcast distribution. The tape went in to the machine and (for the most part) your video played.

But even in the history of tape there was format wars. Betamax and VHS technology were the warring nations. Even though the Beta technology had a better image, VHS was more prolific and took over the consumer tape playing market. Mind you “Beta” did develop and continue to evolve into Betacam as the dominant broadcast tape recording and playing format due to its ability to maintain a high-resolution image and store the luminance and chrominance separately.

So how does this pertain to today’s format wars, and more importantly to the client?

Well the first thing is that the recognition that there is a format war going on and no victor has enmerged. The battlefront is constantly changing and new factions are jumping into the battle every week. By 2009, the United States is supposed to be fully digital in its broadcast of terrestrial signals. This does not mean that your current televisions will become obsolete, but rather you will have to get a converter to process the digital signal to your older television (which I’m sure someone will profit highly in the sale of converters).

So be aware that everyone is trying to outdo each other. Retailers and manufacturers love playing the my-format-is-better-than-yours game and they usually can back it up with a slew of stats and examples. But in reality they are pretty close. It’s not an apples and oranges thing. It’s more of a Cortland versus Russet. They do the same thing but it’s what you like that makes you use it.

Don’t get caught up in the format babble battle. It’s a very technical and changing realm that even the tech people get lost in. The things that are important for the client is to know that no matter if it shot on an old super8 camera or the top end Sony HD-BluRay 1080i camera, that it looks good in the format you are going to show it in and that it will play on everyone’s player (be it VCR, DVD or computer).

I feel that if you are distributing your video to others (internal websites, DVD’s, etc.) you must consider compatibility as it pertains to how the end user will play it. Even DVD players can be finicky with different m2v encoders and disk media. Computers are full or differing codecs and player versions (QuickTime, Windows media Player, etc.) that need to be up to date with how the video was encoded for it to play correctly.

Two schools of thought are on this. One, that the end users will be forced to update their software or two, you encode your video in such a way that it will play in the most amount of players (but you may be sacrificing quality as newer technologies make your product look and play better). The compatibility issue is most important when it comes to computers as there are so many browsers (Internet Explorer, Netscape, Firefox, Safari, etc.), players (Windows Media Player, QuickTime, Real Player, etc.) and different versions of each. You need to not only have the right player but the right version and the right codecs installed.

Sounds overwhelming? Well it’s not too bad. Updates are only a click away and compression software can output multiple format types easily. So you can offer something for everyone. The format wars will spit out a dominate player soon, or rather a dominate format. Of course though, that will mean the next format battle is already being dreamed up for us to watch being played out on our new XYZ player in our homes, cars and laptops.

My advice is to do what works for you for now as it will change by the type you output it. New technologies usually have a legacy factor built into them that enable you to use your existing footage in some manner and most editing systems are built specifically to handle multiple formats and output to what works best for you.

And that’s what we, in video industry, are here to do. We learn all of the mumbo-jumbo for you make it work for you.

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Thanks

CM

www.cmcreative.ca